Political Science - Master's degreehttp://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/7699
Sat, 10 Dec 2016 03:09:10 GMT2016-12-10T03:09:10ZRacial, not rational : economic threat, symbolic racism, and affirmative actionhttp://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/104568
Racial, not rational : economic threat, symbolic racism, and affirmative action
Shohfi, Kyle Daniel
For decades, scholars have debated the determinants of whites' attitudes about racialized policies such as welfare, busing, and affirmative action. While some have argued that whites formulate their positions rationally according to perceived economic threat, others have asserted that such policy attitudes are the function of one's level of symbolic racism, with little to no influence from economic considerations. Using data from the 2012 Cooperative Congressional Elections Study and demographic data, I assess the effects of actual economic competition and an individual's other attitudes on white opposition to affirmative action. Furthermore, in order to identify the levels, if any, through which the economic threat mechanism operates, this paper measures economic threat in several different ways: at both the level of the individual and the level of whites as a group, and each of these at both the zip code and county levels. I find strong support for the symbolic racism theory of policy attitude formation, as respondent attitudes are driven mostly by racial affect, ideology, and party identification. No matter the level at which economic threat is measured, objective economic conditions do not seem to influence one's attitudes about affirmative action.
Thesis: S.M., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Political Science, 2016.; Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.; Includes bibliographical references (pages 51-54).
Fri, 01 Jan 2016 00:00:00 GMThttp://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/1045682016-01-01T00:00:00ZViet Nam's strategic hamlet: development and denouement.http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/102215
Viet Nam's strategic hamlet: development and denouement.
Prentice, Leland Ernest
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Political Science. Thesis. 1969. M.S.; Bibliography: leaves 252-265.
Wed, 01 Jan 1969 00:00:00 GMThttp://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/1022151969-01-01T00:00:00ZCoordinating science : White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) influence in federal R&D budgetshttp://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/101807
Coordinating science : White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) influence in federal R&D budgets
Halloran, John W., Jr
This thesis examines the role of the White House OSTP in the nation's budgeting for science and technology activities. Interviews conducted by the researcher with members of the White House staff as well as federal agency officials are the primary empirical support, with analysis of annual priority memoranda and presidential budget requests reinforcing the findings. The original contribution of this research is to highlight limitations of responsive competence despite presidential attempts to coordinate the R&D bureaucracy. In science policy, presidents obtain responsive competence by hiring entrepreneurial OSTP staff members in the areas that most align with their priorities. The centralized R&D coordination that OSTP does actually perform in budgets is highly constrained by legal authority, bureaucratic resistance, and the epistemic norms of the science policy community itself. The relationship of the President's Science Advisor with the Administration is an important confounder across presidencies
Thesis: S.M., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Political Science, 2015.; Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.; Includes bibliographical references (pages 102-105).
Thu, 01 Jan 2015 00:00:00 GMThttp://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/1018072015-01-01T00:00:00ZPolicy legacies and child care politics in Australia and Canadahttp://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/101806
Policy legacies and child care politics in Australia and Canada
Pasolli, Kelly E
This study explores the puzzle of why Australia and Canada have followed significantly different paths in national-level child care policy despite their otherwise similar welfare state structures. Australia has developed a relatively generous system of public subsidies to support the provision of care for young children, while at the same time relying increasingly on the market to deliver child care. In contrast, Canada has extremely low levels of public spending and service provision, resulting in a less expansive system of regulated child care. I trace these divergent outcomes to the impact of post-WWII child care policy legacies in these countries and the way that these legacies interact with the changing politics of the welfare state to produce variation. In Canada, child care policy was first established within a social assistance framework as a service intended to combat poverty, while in Australia, child care was introduced as an economic policy to facilitate women's workforce participation. The differences in the intended goals of these policies affected the subsequent patterns of child care politics and policy development in these two countries, leading to the divergent outcomes observed today.
Thesis: S.M., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Political Science, 2015.; "September 2015." Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.; Includes bibliographical references (pages 58-63).
Thu, 01 Jan 2015 00:00:00 GMThttp://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/1018062015-01-01T00:00:00Z